


The Old Tin Can

by mcfair_58



Category: Little House on the Prairie (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-09
Updated: 2020-11-09
Packaged: 2021-03-09 05:40:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,664
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27479704
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mcfair_58/pseuds/mcfair_58
Summary: Laura learns a lesson from an old tin can.
Kudos: 1





	The Old Tin Can

The Old Tin Can

“Pa, how come people get sick?”  
Charles Ingalls turned from his work to look at his middle girl. Laura had been watching him for some time now, as fascinated by him running an adze up and down a rough piece of lumber as a biologist would have been looking at some new species of plant. As he put the tool down and wiped his dust covered hands on the legs of his trousers, he tried to remember what it had been like to live each day as if it was a new wonder.  
Like God said they should.  
“What makes you ask?” he replied as he made his way over to the hay bale Laura was sitting on. “Is someone you know doin’ poorly?”  
She nodded her head solemnly. “That new girl, Jessie Carter? Her ma’s sick and like to die.”  
Charles cast his mind back to the last church meeting. There’s been mention of Hazel Carter. She’d been ill for some time and no one really knew what caused it. Doc Baker suspected an underlyin’ infectivity of some kind. Of late, she’d taken a turn for the worse. The congregation was praying for her.   
“Now, Half-pint, ain’t no one said anything about Mrs. Carter dyin’. She’s got people prayin’ for her night and day. Like as not, she’ll pull through.”  
The little face looking at him was unconvinced. “But what if she doesn’t?”  
Charles drew a breath.   
Here it came.   
“Then it’s God’s will and we have to accept it.”  
Laura chewed on that one for a moment. “But, Pa, why would God want anyone’s ma to die?”  
Meaning, what if it was ‘her’ ma?  
These were the times when he wasn’t sure he was cut out to be a father. His own walk with God had been like Jacobs’. They’d tussled and wrassled and argued up and down about things he disagreed with and didn’t want to do. And while God hadn’t wrenched his hip bone out of its socket, you could say that he ‘limped’ now and then.   
Like when that tornado came through and he gave up.   
“What have you learned about prayin’ in Sunday school?” he asked.  
“That it’s like talking to God,” she answered.   
“So, did you ask God?”  
Laura’s rosebud lips wrinkled, along with her per little nose. “…kind of. I didn’t really know what to ask.” She let out a sigh. “So, I kind of told Him I was mad at Him.” His child’s eyes fastened on his face as she paled. “Does that mean I’m going to Hell?”  
Charles swallowed his chuckle as he placed an arm around his daughter’s shoulders. “No. God’s okay with you bein’ mad at Him. You should know that. You’ve read the Psalms.”  
Two of his favorites were: ‘Awake! Why sleepest thou, O Lord? Arise, cast us not off forever!’ and ‘How long shall I take counsel in my soul, having sorrow in my heart daily? How long shall mine enemy be exalted over me?.’  
That King David, he sure knew how to complain.  
“So you told God you were mad. Did you tell Him what you wanted him to do?”  
The little girl frowned. “Do you mean, did I ask him to make Mrs. Carter not die?”   
Charles shook his head. “I meant what I said.”  
“Yeah, I told him. Pretty loud, too.” Laura squirmed. “So am I going to Hell for that?”  
This time he laughed out loud. “It’s a good thing your Ma ain’t out here listenin’ to how many times you think you lost your salvation in one prayer. Half-pint, you know you can’t lose it once you got it. Right?”  
“That kind of puzzles me too, Pa.”  
Why, when he’d gotten up on the wrong side of the bed that mornin’, tripped and fallen over his boots while pullin’ up his trousers, hit his head on the bed post and said a few choice words he oughtn’t too, missed his breakfast coffee – and had to deal with a carpentry job that was a royal-pain-in the you-know-what…. Why God chose this day of all days for him to be a fount of wisdom, he would never understand.  
He took that back. Yes, he did.   
God had a sense of humor.   
“Why’s it puzzle you, half-pint?”  
“If I can’t lose my salvation for doin’ wrong, and God forgives me for everything I do do wrong – like yellin’ at Him and telling him I don’t like what He’s doing – and….” She eyed him. “And maybe saying a few words I shouldn’t now and then…. Then why can’t I just do what I want to do and then ask Him to forgive me ‘cause He always does anyhow?”  
So, she’d been listenin’ this morning.   
Why did children always listen when they shouldn’t and never when they should?  
He swallowed his sigh.   
“There’s a reason for that, Half-pint. A good one.”  
“Okay. What is it?”  
Charles thought a moment. “Why are you worried about whether or not Mrs. Carter dies? She’s not your ma.”  
She looked at him kind of funny. “Huh?”  
“Just give me an answer.”  
“Well, ‘cause I don’t want her to die.”  
“Why?”  
This time his child’s look said he was crazy…or maybe stupid.  
“Because Jessie is my friend and I love her and I don’t want her to be sad.”  
There it was. The word he’d been looking for.   
“Because you ‘love’ her. The reason we don’t go doin’ exactly what we want to be doin’ and just expect God to forgive us for it is because we love Him.” He paused. “You don’t go out and do things you know your Ma and me don’t approve of on purpose, now do you?  
There was a long hesitation before she spoke. “So, I really can’t lose my salvation over anything?”  
“Laura….”  
She grinned. “Just foolin’, Pa. Of course not.”  
“Well, it’s the same way with us and God. You know it says in John that ‘He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me.’” We try to do what God wants us to because we love Him and don’t want to hurt Him.”  
Laura had that look. She was thinking again.   
“So, Pa, we’re back where we started. If God loves Mrs. Carter, why would He want her to die?”  
Kids. They had minds like steel traps.   
Charles thought again and then he rose and moved to his work bench. He shifted a few things around before he found the object he wanted and then he brought it back with him and sat down.   
“Here,” he said.  
Laura took one look at it and scooted back. “Thanks, Pa, but no thanks!”  
He looked at the object. It was an old metal tin can, battered and bent. The label had fallen off long ago and it had gotten wet once, so it was rusted all over and pocked like a dry field after a hail storm. There were even a few holes in the bottom.  
Come to think of it, it kind of smelled too since he’d used it once to hold a handful of manure.   
“You sure?”  
Her eyes went wide and she nodded. “Sure, I’m sure.”  
Charles took hold of the lid and popped it off, and then upended the can. His child’s eyes went even wider as she watched a dozen bright shining coins fall out of it.   
“Pa!”  
The can had been his ma’s. She’d used it to keep her egg money in. He’d carried it with him from Wisconsin to Kansas and on to Minnesota. It had been used for a hundred things it was never meant to be used for. Right now he kept his spare change in it.   
“Here’s the thing, Half-pint. This rusty old can ain’t worth much. It serves a purpose. It’s useful. But one of these days I’m gonna have to throw it out.”  
“But Pa, the coins!”  
He looked at them, glinting against his rough flesh. Charles lips quirked.   
Fact was, he was kind of gettin’ kind of rusty too.   
“I know. You see, Half-pint, what’s on the outside don’t count much. It’s just a shell for what’s inside. For Mrs. Carter, that shell is her sick body. Everybody’s prayin’ for Jessie’s ma to keep livin’, but if her body can’t be fixed – just like this old can – then it’s best to take the treasure out where it can shine.”   
“You mean in Heaven?”  
He put the coins back in the can and put it and the lid at his feet. “God don’t see things the way we do. We want to squeeze out as much time here on Earth as we can. To God, ninety or a hundred years aren’t even the blink of an eye. He isn’t watchin’ a clock, He’s watchin’ over us and when it’s time, He takes us home.”  
She thought a moment. “But Jessie will still be sad.”  
Charles hugged his child’s shoulders. “Yes, she will, and it’s up to you and me and your Ma and sisters to make sure she knows she’s loved if it comes to it.” He paused. “You know what?” He reached to the ground and brought the can up and took out about half the coins. “What’s say you and me go into town and buy something pretty for Mrs. Carter and take it out and visit with both her and Jessie?”  
Laura beamed. “Oh, Pa! That’s a wonderful idea! Can we go now?”  
Charles rose to his feet and held his hand out for her to take. “Right now!”  
“I love you, Pa!” the little girl exclaimed as she circled his waist with her arms.   
“I love you too, Half-pint,” he said, returning the hug.   
Just like God loves us all.  
_____  
END

John: 4:16 And so we know and rely on the love God has for us. God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them.


End file.
